Teaching Geoscience Online

Virtual Workshop

We had some interesting examples of students from far away places. Where have your students been while taking your course?

Usually I am the person who is the farthest away in my courses, since I live in Montana and teach for SUNY in NY. But I have had students deployed in Iraq, which I find mightily impressive. That student's perspective was especially relevant during our discussion about energy resources. I think that was one of the moments when I realized how powerful online teaching can be.

I typically get students within 30 miles; however, sometimes they are a hundred+ miles away.

When I was teaching for the University of South Dakota I had students all across South Dakota, one in Texas, New Orleans, and West Virginia. Now that I am teaching in Nebraska, most are within 30 miles or so of Wayne, NE.

This post was edited by Avery Swearer on Jun, 2016
Turn it around. I use distance learning to teach class from wherever I am. I've taught live from Austin, Seattle and Atlanta last semester. I use something called "Wirecast" (http://www.telestream.net/wire-cast/overview.htm, got the academic discount) to do this. I still get student questions and can pose questions for their response using LectureTools (http://www.lecturetools.com ). Students can be in the class or at home or wherever.

I'm in Duluth, MN. My community college students came from all over -- the farthest few have been deployed in the Gulf War. The closest is a student who lived behind me and a second who regularly bagged my groceries at the store a mile from home.

90% of students are local and within the university's coverage area, but 5-10% are out of the region, out-of-state, even out of the country and in constant motion because of work.

I have taught from Italy and Hawaii, as well as from research conferences around the country (especially visits to NSF).